


The Rain Will Fall And It Will Be Red

by happycookiie



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Character Death, Closure, F/M, Friendship, Love Between Co-Stars, Real Life Counterparts, Romance, TV Relationships, slight angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-29
Updated: 2015-10-31
Packaged: 2018-04-28 18:56:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 9,091
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5101946
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/happycookiie/pseuds/happycookiie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A whisper of hope was all it took for Norman to fall in love with Bethyl, and a bullet to the head was all it took to send it all crashing to the ground. Long after that episode, Norman invites Emily to the cast's Halloween party, and tries to deal with his feelings for her that might or might not be influenced by Daryl's feelings for Beth.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Still no goodbye

**Author's Note:**

> kay so I don't usually write fics for actual people, because I find it semi-creepy, but I was hit with inspiration and really wanted to write this. I love Norman and Emily, their chemistry is undeniable, and their friendship is adorable! I also wanted to explore the way Daryl and Beth might flow through them, so I created this! Short multi-chapter fic for Halloween (probably like two or three chapters total).
> 
> Though I do believe Beth will come back at some point, this fic presumes Beth is gone for good and explores how both Norman and Emily deal with that. Obviously they're both crushed, but there's still hope. Because if there wasn't, then what would be the point of Beth at all?
> 
> WARNING! Please note that there will be spoilers for the first three episodes of TWD season six, so do not read if you don't want to be spoiled!

It's been months since that last day on set. Months, and she's said her goodbyes to everyone. But for some reason she still hasn't said it to him.

Norman watches the rain fall against the window of his NYC apartment, and heaves a sigh, fingers strumming his bottom lip as he watches the drops of water patter against the glass. He's sitting on his couch with the TV blaring loud, the remote god knows where, and his phone lying on the low table... Screen blank.

He hasn't really expected a reply instantly. Of  _course_  she would be busy. Especially since her career has just started to sky-rocket into life, after Beth plummeted to her death. Always a price to pay for showbiz.

There he is, two nights before Halloween, lounging around half dressed, with a cold mug of coffee balanced on his stomach, waiting for a reply from a woman who probably wouldn't give one for another six hours tops at the least. She's out there making the most of that opportunity, living, and he's just sat there doing nothing like that. He's always felt inferior when compared to her, even though she's told him time and time again that his masses of fans would strongly disagree. She's always joked about his legion of fans coming to his rescue whenever he was in peril. Or to slay anything that got in their way from loving him.  _Like her_. They'd both gotten a good giggle scrolling through the internet the night the episode with the funeral home aired.

His phone buzzes. Probably Andy or Melissa responding to one of his earlier texts he's long forgotten about, or Mingus reminding him to come pick him up on Sunday or something. So when he picks it up he's pleasantly surprised to see the name  _Emily_  pop up.

_I actually AM free this year! sure I'll come!_

He smiles.

He hadn't expected a reply so soon, never mind one  _agreeing_  to his request that she come spend Halloween with him and the rest of the cast. He knows Lauren misses her especially, and Steven, even though she's told them both goodbye more than once already.

But still nothing to him. No goodbye.

_good_.

That's kind of shit, he thinks, the minute he's pressed send. He knows how much she hates those one word replies, so he types out something else to add to avoid her irritation.

_lookin forward 2 seeing u._

It's too late when he realises he's forgotten to include an  _all_  at the front of the sentence, but then he thinks that maybe he never meant to put that in the first place anyway.

_Me too :)_

His grin widens and he puts his phone back down on the table. The coffee in his mug is beyond cold, but he doesn't care. Maybe it's the heater that's gone haywire and is making the room like a boiler, or the TV playing marathons of old slasher horror. Or maybe it's something else entirely. Something that started with  _Have a little faith._

And he did. He did have faith. That's one of the things he and Daryl shared.

Because of two hopeful people who were really very much one and the same.

.

.

It's still raining when he arrives at the airport that next morning, so he holds the umbrella he's brought up over his head. It's fucking  _yellow_  of all colours, a bright sunny yellow, and hasn't dulled at all since Steven bought it for him for a laugh. But hell, maybe it'll work as a disguise for anyone who might recognise him, if they can't already through the pouring rain and with the cap that's far too big for him covering his eyes.

A kid passes him on the way to the front entrance, a little boy with a waterproof Spiderman raincoat. He's holding a bag of what looks like Halloween props, so Norman shrugs it off as being a part of some costume. Not that there was anything wrong with Spiderman anyway.

He arrives at the front double doors to the airport and lowers the umbrella since there's cover. He shakes it and stands for a while, staring out into the waterfall that's pouring down outside.

"Norman?"

He turns his head to see an all too familiar blonde standing to his right, staring up at him with big blue eyes that make up for the dull grey of the sky. She's like a ray of sunshine, he's thought before. There doesn't need to be without a cloud in the sky for her to have that kind of demeanour.

Emily smiles. "I didn't recognise you underneath that lovely umbrella," she says with a grin.

He gives her a look, but it's over masked by the relief visible at seeing her, and he's pulling her in for a bone-crushing hug before he knows it.

He's dropped the neon umbrella and wraps both arms around her, inhaling the smell of her mixed with fresh rain. And he's perfectly happy until he starts to feel a rough  _nibbling_  at his neck, so he pulls back, hands still planted on her shoulders, and blinks in bewilderment.

She erupts into a louder fit of giggles at that, and shoves a hand inside her mouth to pull something out.

"They're fake fangs," she larks, showing him, "I bought them in the gift shop on my way out. You didn't think they were  _real_ , did you?"

He can't wipe the massive smile off his face then, and squeezes her hand before reaching down for her suitcases.

"C'mon Dracula, let's get you in somewhere no one'll stake you."

"I'd like to see them try! They might have gotten Lauren on The Vampire Diaries, but they're not getting me."

"You do realise you're saying this in front of a guy who can use a crossbow,"

"Maybe I'm just not scared of you, Mr Hunter. You're the one who should be afraid of  _me_."

"I ain't afraid of nothin' though."

They both break out into laughter at that. Her because she finds the reference funny, and him because he knows he's an even bigger liar than Daryl.

.

.

Lauren pretty much screams at the sight of Emily when he walks into the grill a couple of blocks from his apartment, and she throws her arms around her and shrieks into her neck. They chatter on about stuff Norman has  _no clue_  what they're talking about, shovelling breakfast into their mouths like fuel, and he just sits staring.

Emily's hair is lighter, he notices. Not quite platinum blonde like she keeps saying she wants to go, but lacking the dark brown roots she had to keep for her role on the show... The role she no longer has.

He watches her happily chattering away with Lauren and wonders how the hell someone could make the decision to axe her off, especially for the reasons the producing crew did too. Emily brought light into the studio, and cast it whenever she acted. The natural performer flowed through her as Beth, the singer in her pouring out in fine melodies of hope that warmed every cast member and character to the bone. He looks at Emily and wonders just how anyone could  _ever_  want to take Beth Greene away from her, and everyone else.

She catches him staring and waves a hand in front of his face. Her and Lauren then explode with laughter at the dumbfounded expression he gives, only the smile on Emily's face is ever soft. She looks at him like everything Daryl wanted to be looked at by Beth, with every inch of warmth and silent tenderness, and he wonders just where Beth ends, and Emily begins.

"You still with us, Dixon?" Lauren teases. Her natural accent has melted away into Maggie's southern drawl, and her smile is playful.

"Course I am, Greene."

"Good. Can't have you spacin' out all the time whenever you're in the same place as my little sister an' givin' her googly eyes."

Emily nudges Lauren and giggles. " _Maggie_!" she feigns annoyance, and they all laugh.

.

.

It's past noon by the time they leave their little breakfast shop, and Lauren hugs Emily tight before she departs. "I'll see you at the party," she promises, "See if you can convince Norman not to dress up as his cat this year."

"Oh I'm not sure I'm capable of something like  _that_."

"Just get him to be something that doesn't involve a pin on tail or feline ears."

"Hey, my cosplay of Eye in the Dark last year was killer," Norman argues, "I totally nailed it and you know it."

"Sorry, but Melissa won best costume last year."

"She went as Carol!  _Herself_!"

"So? She looked the best!" Emily giggled.

"I don't care, it's cheating."

"Well maybe if you go as Daryl this year,  _you'll_  win." Lauren says.

"Maybe I will."

It's then, when Lauren and Emily are saying their temporary goodbyes that Norman wonders what Emily is going as. She had the fake fangs, so maybe she's just going as a vampire. It's probable, but still, he's curious.

The rain is only a faint drizzle as he and Emily walk down the streets, him holding the yellow umbrella up above the two of them. Her eyes are fixed down on the pavement, in order to avoid stepping in any puddles in her fancy platform boots, but she still manages to focus on him as well.

"What did you think of last week's episode?" she asks.

"'One where Glenn dies?"

"Yeah. It's a good thing it  _was_  that one, or that would've been a major spoiler."

"…Shit, I guess it would."

"But what did you think of it?"

He looks at her whilst striding over a particularly large puddle, eyes flickering to the hand she places on his arm to steady herself from toppling over.

"What did  _you_  think?" he asks.

Her lips pout and she raises her brows. "I don't think Glenn is really dead." she says finally.

"Why do you think that?"

"I dunno, it was just... Weird. Like the camera went all funny, and you didn't actually see if it was him or the other guy getting torn apart. Plus, they played the theme song at the end. And he didn't get an RIP in The Talking Dead afterwards."

"The theme song played when Beth died too."

Bad move. And he knows it and instantly curses himself when her face falls. Silence falls and the only sound is the clunk of their boots on the pavement and the pitter-patter of the rain hitting the umbrella.

"Emily..." he starts.

"Hey. You don't have to apologise. It's okay, really. It happened like half a year ago anyway so it doesn't really matter anymore."

"It does matter."

She looks at him. He tries to make his expression seem as honest and genuine as he can, but he just ends up doing that smoulder thing with his eyes that the fans claim is  _just irresistible_. The way he looks at her is burning and probing, and there's no candle lights here to complete it. But that doesn't stop warmth from seeping into his belly from the look on her face.

"All I was trying to say," she says finally, "Is that you don't have to worry about saying something that you think will set me off. I'm fine, I swear. I'm good."

Memories of  _that_  song swirl around in his head, along with pianos, caskets, and little turtle ornaments with love notes attached to them. He remembers when he and Emily laid themselves down on the lawn of that funeral home after wrapping up with filming, and just breathed in the afternoon air, all caked in fake mud and makeup. She started singing whilst they did that, her voice tired and quiet from all the lines Beth had said that day, and Norman had just listened to her throaty singing voice and thought it was the best sound he'd ever heard.

_We'll lay in the lawn, and we'll be good._

And he thinks... If it's this bad for him, how much worse it is for Daryl?

"For the party..." he changes the subject desperately, trying something,  _anything_  to distract himself from thinking those thoughts, "What're you going as?"

She turns her gaze forward again and chews on the inside of her cheek. And he thought her answer wouldn't really be a vampire, but what her answer  _is_  isn't what he expected at all.

"Well..." she says quietly, voice almost inaudible in the rain, "I was going to be Beth."

It's his turn to say it now.

"Oh."


	2. Pine for summer

They don't feel like doing anything that next day.

It's one more day until Halloween, and they honestly aren't in the mood for people—fans or not—that they'll have to talk to, clothes they'll have to put on, and rain they'll be drenched by unless they take that damn umbrella out again.

Emily lays on her back on his couch, feet plopped up on the arm with her own arm hanging loosely over the edge, and another slung across her stomach. Norman stands in the doorway to the bedroom, listening to her hum a tune he's surprised to find he hasn't heard before, until she notices him standing there and smiles. She sits up and pulls her knees to her chest, legs bare in the short yoga pants she's wearing, and pats the cushion beside her. Her smile is lazy, and her hair is ruffled from sleep, but she still manages to look fucking pretty as ever without even trying to.

But she does have one hell of a big knot in her hair.

He wanders over to the sofa in his navy dressing gown and plonks himself down beside her. She notices the knot in her hair then and starts working at getting it out, and as she does, she spreads her legs back out and lays them across his lap. Unintentionally perhaps, or on purpose, but he honestly doesn't care because he's perfectly content to just sit there while they're both barely dressed and watch her fiddle with her hair.

"Do you have a hairbrush lying around anywhere?" she asks finally, frustration creeping into her tone as she tosses the bundle of messy blonde waves over her shoulder almost melodramatically.

"Uh,"

He scans the room quickly for what she's looking for, and rubs his head when he can't seem to trace one. "I swear there's one around here somewhere..." he mutters, moving to stand up... But colliding with Emily as she does the same and going tumbling onto the sofa with her in a heap.

They land awkwardly, him on his back with a leg hooked over her hip, and her sprawled out across him and tangled up in his limbs. She tries to move, but it only worsens the situation and they just get even more stuck. She turns her gaze down to look at him then, before she bursts out into giggles. That tinkling, light, oh so Emily giggle. Her cheeks are slightly pink, but you wouldn't notice unless you were the close range Norman was in that moment.

Her hair falls from behind her ear, and he instantly goes to push it back into place. His fingers comb through those locks of hair, and move down to linger on her cheekbone. His thumb runs the length of her face slowly, and she does little to stop him. They've always been close, closer so since  _that_  episode, but they've never overstepped any boundaries. Sometimes their hugs are slightly lingering, yes, and sometimes his innocent kisses stray a little too close to her mouth (not that it would matter since he's kissed pretty much everyone on set by now). And there's those times when the looks they give each other slightly mirror the ones Daryl and Beth would share, but it never really evolved into anything deeper. Nothing more sensual. There's no point in complicating what might be the best friendship Norman has ever had by letting onscreen chemistry cloud their judgement.

Only it's not always just  _onscreen_  chemistry with them.

Emily bites her lip and tries to crawl off him, this time her attempt ending in success as their limbs detangle and they sit on the sofa quietly. Once again the sound of rain falling breaks the silence, and Norman's mouth twitches. He moves his hand to rub the stubble there and turns his gaze down to their crossed legs, and feels his own cheeks growing warm.

"That song you were singing," he says, "I don't think I've heard it before."

Her cheeks grow a little pinker too.

"You haven't."

"New one?"

"Yeah."

"It finished?"

"Not... quite."

"What's it about?"

She stares at him with big glittering eyes, and her cheeks grow even redder, only this flush holds something more than just embarrassment… He holds her gaze and furrows his brows to try to get across that he doesn't understand... Until he starts to think he  _does_.

She fidgets. "It's about someone... Like a lot of other songs I've written..." she murmurs, "I've only got a couple of lines and the basic tune though, and a basic concept."

"Someone, huh…?  _Ryan_?"

She blinks at the mention of Ryan Adams, the guy half the globe thinks is her new boyfriend, and the flush leaves her cheeks. And it's that reaction that makes him ponder that maybe the male singer isn't as cosy with her as the press seem to think.  _Maybe_ …

"No." she says, "Not Ryan."

He wants to ask.  _Desperately_. He wants to whisper the question he knows she must be thinking he's thinking. Wants to so badly he's afraid of just how badly he wants something that's really so small.

_Is it me?_

_Is it?_

_Mess_  was about him, she admitted that with her shy little giggle.  _Last Chance_  was for Daryl and Beth,  _Weapons_  too probably by the lyrics. So this new one she was thinking up might not be, but still... Still...

"It's actually for Scott." she admits finally, and it shocks him quite a bit.

" _Scott_? As in Wilson, or Gimple?"

"Well actually... Gimple."

Norman's pretty sure his eyes must be bulging out of his head at this, and he can't seem to stop blinking. Rapid flutters of his eyelids, wiping the bewilderment from his vision. Trying so hard to comprehend just why she'd want to write a song about or for that particular person.

"Why  _him_?" he finally asks, "What's this concept you've got?"

Her brow furrows. "Norman… You sound... annoyed."

"Annoyed? I guess I kinda  _am_  annoyed, Emily. I mean, sure, you can write about what you want, but... Why  _him_? He killed you–"

"He killed  _Beth_."

"He took her away from you. From Daryl… From  _me_. Doesn't that mean anything to you?"

Her expression softens, and with it Norman's rage towards the arguably risky show runner. He holds Emily's heart-wrenchingly gentle gaze and wants to cry; fucking  _cry_  for her. Over the loss of a fictional charisma she played, who his own character had only had about four episodes together with. He'd done his crying already. Sat on an apple box and cried like a little baby before they were called to shoot that god dreadful scene. And he remembered wondering at first why the hell he was so beat up about the loss of one character. It wasn't like losing cast and characters was new to him, they'd all lost so many over the years, so many that it shouldn't matter this much by now.

But he'd looked at Emily from across the set of Grady Memorial Hospital's parking lot, and he'd seen the tears shimmering away in her eyes that she refused to let fall. And he saw Beth in that moment, holding her own broken self together and being strong for everyone around her. Because that was what both Beth and Emily did.

Held on.

 _Hold on_ , she'd sung back in season three,  _You gotta hold on._  He'd looked at her before they filmed that scene and saw her holding on. And he thought:  _Just you hold on, Em. Just you wait. I'm gonna get Beth out of this._

 _Her_ and _you._

"Of course it does, Norman." she says, "That's exactly why I'm writing this song. For that reason  _exactly_... For her."

He reaches out and clasps her hand, winding his large fingers around her much smaller ones, and squeezes. She looks down at their intertwined fingers, so alike that scene in the cemetery in front of the grave, and she squeezes back. His eyes are burning with that same quiet intensity that he isn't even aware of doing, and before he can say anything in response, the TV flares to life. They jump at it, the channel coincidentally being the horror channel, and an old movie plays where a young blonde is sliced to death by a psychopath's long machete. The volume is far too loud, and the woman's cries echo throughout the apartment, shrill and loud, as Norman searches for the remote. When he finally finds it and turns the volume down, he turns his attention back to Emily, and is surprised to see her fixated by the film.

Her eyes are wide and her pupils are blown huge, and she's  _shaking_. Her shoulders are visibly quaking, and she's brought her hands up to lightly rub her bare forearms. Her eyes are glowing with the light of the TV screen, her own light dulled.

Norman plants his hands on her shoulders and forces her to look at him, her eyes massive and frightened like a spooked deer, and then he pulls her into his chest and holds her there. He feels her tense up at his action, but he doesn't let it discourage him. He snakes his arms around her and pulls her further into his embrace, the front flaps of his dressing gown rolling open to reveal the dark hairs on his chest. Her hands are trapped between her chest and his, making her unable to return the hug, but he only pulls her ever closer to him. Whether it's him holding Emily tight as he can as a means of comfort… or Daryl reaching out and latching onto Beth before she can go, he doesn't know.

But that doesn't really matter, because Emily muffles a sob, and thrusts her head into the warmth of his bare chest. And she cries.

He holds her ever tighter then, fisting a handful of chaotic hair and gripping her like a vice. And she doesn't complain, because she only pushes further into him, burning her tear-soaked cheeks into his embrace and running her trembling wet lips along his flesh as she sobs. Her hands have come up and lay planted flat above his breast, and he's sure she can feel the steady heartbeat thumping out onto her palms, like the steady beat of a drum.

He holds her as she cries for losing her TV counterpart, herself, and  _everything_  else. And Norman rubs a hand up and down her back and nestles his head onto the messy crown of her head, and breathes her in. And he wants to cry for the chance she lost to be the best thing that ever happened to Daryl, and himself.

.

.

They get the trimmings and decorations out. After her little crying session, Emily complains they need to something to make the place seem a little more interesting;  _exciting_. So she opens one of her suitcases and digs out an array of things—fake slime, soft material cobwebs, plastic spiders, banners... She empties it all out onto the floor and they stare at it.

Her smile is back, bright as ever, and she wipes her tear-stained cheeks with the inside of her wrist.

"You going to help me put these up?"

He grunts and gets to work, winding the cobwebs around lampshades, trailing them around the apartment in silk twisted webs that catches Emily at some point, and she squeals. He starts laughing when he sees her stuck there like a fly, though she looks more like a butterfly, and abandons his work to go help her out of the binding.

The stringy cotton is wrapped around her legs and caught in her muddled hair. She looks at him accusingly, but the tiny smile on her lips tells him she isn't angry for her predicament.

"Bit of a mess you've got yourself into here," he remarks, poking at the cobwebs coyly.

"I always do when I'm with you."

"You weren't complaining in your song about it."

Her smile widens.

"Always the observant one when it comes to my music career," she says tauntingly.

"You bet. I'm your number one fan, remember?"

"And here I used to think my singing annoyed you."

His movements still and he meets her gaze, the playful laughter in his eyes transformed into something deeper, something bolder. She realises what she's said then and giggles, and he swears it's like he's only half himself, and she's half Beth.

"Your singing never annoyed me..." he says, "Besides. It's not like I've got a jukebox hiding around in here either."

Her expression softens and she doesn't seem to care that she's stuck in a web anymore. Neither does he, in all honesty.

Her fingers find his through all the wiry white cotton and clasp together, and she squeezes his larger fingers. Her thumb brushes the tiny star tattoo on the side of his hand gently, no more than a soft stroke really, but for some reason it feels like she's burned him. Like Daryl did with the bud of his cigarette at the foot of that towering tree, that's branches hid his falling tears.

Tears that sounded so much like rain, falling endlessly, sometimes invisible to others, but ever present.

The drops of rain hitting the window suddenly is louder than before, and the sky outside dulls. Grey clouds gather in the place of once snowy white ones, and cloak the city in a dark, lifeless glow. Like a ghost town. But Norman feels only colour and light in his shabby little apartment with Emily, as she brushes her fingers across his hand, and he reaches out and puts another hand on her bare shoulder.

He remembers the sunshine the morning after the storm on the show, the episode the music box started playing again, and wonders what that even meant. What that little melody machine was even supposed to represent. Lauren said it was Beth to her, and the rest of the cast agreed. But if that was in fact what the little box was, then  _why_? Why have it represent  _her_ , if she was indeed gone for good? Why taunt him and Daryl with a false hope that had been stripped from them both in the darkest hour, and mockingly throw little reminders throughout the rest of the run? He's starting to think that long winter Rick's group spent on the run at the end of season two had never actually ended, at least metaphorically. The sun had stopped shining the day the Greene farm burst into inferno, and had never come out again…

Except  _Beth_  had been the sun for a while.

_"...We'll drink up our grief,"_

And now she's gone out too.

_"And pine for summer."_

Like everyone and every _thing_. Gone, far away, and never coming back. Like Merle, Sophia, Hershel,  _every_  other character they've lost. Glenn might be coming back, like Emily and millions of others think, but  _Beth_  might not, despite the loyal and devoted fans she has theorising reasons for her survival.

Delusional they may be, but it sure as hell hurts less than letting go of that last flame of hope that's burning.

_"And we'll buy beer to shotgun, and we'll lay in the lawn,"_

Norman's starting to think Beth might not ever be coming back, that Scott Gimple really did just trash her in the worst possible way.

But then he remembers the lines he had Beth say to Daryl during their scenes together, those lines that had all been chosen so carefully.  _Have a little faith. If you don't have hope._  Were all those just words of taunt and just fucking cruelty? Or were they something more? Something deeper. He thinks back to every little thing Beth Greene said, and wonders she really has met her end. Because it sure as hell doesn't feel like it. For him or the array of her fans. And maybe not for Emily too, with the song she's writing for Gimple, about something he has no clue about. Only, he does, he realises. He does have a clue. He just never thought to think it before. That perhaps all this time, Emily was holding onto that last little bit of hope too, desperately wishing,  _praying_ , that it's not the end. And if she and Beth taught Norman anything... It's that prayers sometimes don't just go unanswered.

Daryl prayed for a miracle all his life, and he finally got one, even in the midst of the zombie apocalypse. In the form of sweet little Beth, Hershel's youngest daughter.

She whispered hope in his ear, and pulled him along past the graves of loved ones, and sung sweet songs of solace and joy. And for the first time in what felt like forever, Daryl felt a shimmer of resolve growing from her influence.

Norman did too.

_"And we'll be good."_


	3. I get it now

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HAPPY HALLOWEEN EVERYONE!! I love you all and hope you have the best of times! And to celebrate, I'm posting the last two chapters of this BOTH TODAY. This one this morning, and the final sometime this afternoon. Hope you like!

Finally, it's time. Social media has gone haywire, texts are shooting straight to Norman's phone, and basically every channel is broadcasting horror movies.

Norman fiddles with the cap on his head as he waits in the kitchen, swirling his finger around a bowl of red icing, dipping the finger in his mouth every so often, even though there's no one around to witness his gross action.

Emily is in the bathroom taking a shower, as the roaring sound of running water hitting the shower base would suggest, leaving him alone to meddle with the ingredients of sugar-filled treats. They spent all of yesterday doing not much-well to be honest, nothing, apart from lining decorations here and there. So Emily insists that they get their act together today and make some goodies to take with them later.

Lauren called earlier, and she must have said something really funny because Emily was still laughing to herself a whole twenty minutes after the call had ended.

He scoops a clump of red icing up onto his thumb and puts it in his mouth, the flavour sugary and painstakingly sweet. Whilst doing to, he slides open his phone and looks at the array of text messages he's got. Like he expected, there are some from Andy, some from Steven, a couple from Melissa and Danai, and also… Emily.

He blinks.

Emily?

He opens the message.

_U had better not finger all the bowls while I'm out of the room._

…Whoops. She must have sent it before she got in the shower. He retracts his hand from the bowl and slides it across the side, far enough so she won't suspect anything, but not so far it will look suspicious. He then picks up a spoon and starts stirring some cake mix in another bowl, and pours it out into a baking tray.  _Birthday Cake_  comes onto his MP3 player then, and he grins to himself as he hums along lowly.

The artist of the song herself comes in then, clad in a casual blue dress with a fluffy towel draped around her shoulders. She's just blow-dried her hair so it hangs down her shoulders in soft fluffy waves, the knot from yesterday long gone. It dazzles in the yellow kitchen light like gentle gloss, and Norman flashes a smile.

"Is that one of  _my_  songs you're singing along to there?"

"What makes you think that?" he asks innocently, pulling both earphones from his ears.

She raises her eyebrows and shakes her head. "I wrote and sang it, Norman. I think I'd recognise it, don't you?"

"Sure, whatever you say,"

She pulls the towel off her shoulders and lays it on the back of a chair, then steps over to his side. She eyes the bowl he was previously eating from suspiciously, but doesn't pass comment. Her smell drifts into his nose and nearly over masks the cooking smells, and he discretely breathes it in. She smells of everything nice he can think of. Sunshine, soap, shampoo,  _light_. He didn't understand what they meant in all those fanfictions where they described Beth as tasting of light, but standing there and breathing Emily in… He thinks he might finally understand.

"Pick up the pace! We both know how much Chandler can put away when he wants to, this isn't going to be enough.

"You do know  _this_  isn't the only food that's gonna be there."

"And you think that alone is going to satisfy him?"

.

.

He very nearly has half a heart attack when she steps into the room before they're supposed to go to the party, dressed from head to toe in what can only be described in one word… No more, no less…

Beth.

Norman stares at her from his place at the centre of the room, and just gawks, and she fidgets awkwardly. It's been so long since he's seen her dressed like that, like  _her_ , and honestly it feels... He doesn't know how it feels. It's good, right, but at the same time it also feels wrong. Like they're doing something forbidden, something dangerous. Scott had Beth shot through the head with a flying bullet, yet here Emily is again, wearing the tattered yellow polo and ripped up jeans once more, no evidence of said bullet in sight. She's painted the scars on her right brow and cheekbone, but there's nothing marring her head. Just clear, fresh skin that has yet to be touched. How it was supposed to be, before he read on in the script and saw those earth shattering, fucking stage directions.

_[Beth is shot through the head]_

That fucking sentence ripped right through him the second he read it, and he found himself reading it over and over again, just in case he'd read it wrong. He imagines how Emily must have felt, since  _he_  had such a drastic reaction to it. It was  _her_  character after all, her portrayal. Of light, and humble beauty, and hope. He imagines she must have read that part through and just felt absolutely crushed. But she'd been told beforehand, apparently, like all the cast who reached their time.

Only the worst thing with Emily was that she  _hadn't_  reached her time. She was just discovering her wings, testing and getting a feel of them, and readying to fly... Then she was shot down with a rifle, unmercifully,  _unfair_ ly.

"Norman?"

He blinks out of it and forces his attention back to her, painful as it is, and manages a smile.

"You look good," he says.

She smiles too, only her smile might be even sadder than his, and she glances down at the floor. "You too."

He's wearing his sleeveless black shirt and leather angel vest, and everything else that makes Daryl, this time covered in slightly more mud and blood than usual—impossible as that sounds—and his face is lined with makeup that resembles grime. It feels like an ordinary day before filming for him, only Emily being here makes it feel a thousand times better. Like they're back at the beginning, running through woods covered in blood and running from walker extras, ending each scene with a high five.

She walks over to him and slips her hand into his, fingers curling around his and intertwining… Like Beth's with Daryl's, and she stares at him with big blue eyes. He stares into her eyes, and finds himself filling with a firmer resolve.

"Ready?" he asks, though he senses his one word question might hold more than one meaning.

She nods. "Yeah."

He thinks there's a double meaning in her answer too.

.

.

They meet Steven and Danai outside the place the Halloween fest is being held, and they both throw their arms around Emily instantly. The sight of her in that costume almost brings tears to their eyes, but they hold them away and force themselves to smile.

Norman already wants to cry for her, and the night hasn't even started yet.

It's dark inside, the room filled with flashing strobe lights, and the music is blaring into wild, incoherent explosions. They make their way through the crowd of zombie extras and people that play the Alexandrians, and find Lauren standing with Melissa, Christian, Sonequa, and Alanna. They all dash to Emily like Steven and Danai, and encircle her in a huge group hug. He thinks Lauren  _is_  crying at Emily's costume, and Christian is still holding tight of her and refusing to let go. It's almost like that last day on set for her outside the hospital grounds, when the entire cast just swarmed her.

He sees the hidden angst flickering on Emily's face as she buries it into Christian's gothic neck brace, and feels himself itching to take her hand and run away from all of this. Take her far away where she'd be safe with him, staring into campfires and eating mud snakes, like it was the end of the world for them too.

His wild thoughts are broken off by a tap on his left shoulder, and he turns to see Chandler standing there in a cape with huge fangs poking out of his mouth. He's with his girlfriend, and she smiles sweetly at Norman, which he returns.

"Hey, Norman!" Chandler yells over the awful music, "I know what you're thinking. Who chose this shit they're playing, huh?"

Norman laughs. "You got me, that's exactly what I'm thinking."

"Emily here?"

He points to where Emily stands having her cheeks poked by Sonequa, who then squeezes her so tight he's surprised she's got any oxygen still left inside her.

"There. Getting attacked by Sonequa."

Chandler laughs at the scene and gives Norman a nod, before leading his girlfriend over to Emily to greet, and Norman stands there in the dancing crowd, watching her and thinking...

_Hold on._

Andy comes and stands next to him then, and plants a beer into his free hand.

"Alright, pal?" he yells into his ear.

Norman throws his other arm around the man's shoulder and pulls him in for a hug. He doesn't miss the opportunity to plant a quick peck on his vulnerable neck either, and Andy shakes his head light-heartedly.

"Took a page from Mel's book, I see, and decided to come as your own character this time."

"Yeah. Me and Emily both."

Andy's gaze falls on Emily for a second, and he smiles. "She looks good," he says, "...It's been a while since I've seen her dressed up like that... And it's good to see."

"It is good."

"You ok?"

There's something about the way Andy asks him that that reminds him of the way Rick spoke to Daryl, after the loss of their hopeful little Greene. The time he said,  _I know you lost something._

Andy spoke like Norman had lost something too, something that had changed him for the worst. But whatever he was implying, Norman wasn't entirely one hundred percent sure what it was. The ambiguity in his tone and question certainly matched that of Rick's, and Norman had to silently applaud the way the man could weave himself into Rick and play a convincing counterpart. There were little parts of their characters in everyone here tonight. Ghosts of their selves that were played out on a TV screen—fighting, killing, trying,  _singing_... They were striving to hard, but they never seemed to get to anything worthwhile. Always running, but never a finish line in sight.

He wonders if Gimple or Kirkman have a goal in mind for how they want the series to end. Or if it will just be an endless battle towards  _god knows what_ , ending in the inevitable bloodbath at the end that would result in  _all_  of their undoing.

"I'm fine, man." Norman says finally, and Andy smiles again.

He puts a hand on his shoulder and pats. "Come find me if you need anything," he says, before he wanders off into the crowd to find Lennie or Alexandra.

Norman returns his attention to Emily, who no longer has people glued to her, and is now just chatting away happily with them. The Norman part of him wants to go join in, but the Daryl part says no. He has to stand there, watching, never joining in, and just always watching. Whether it be watching her at a Halloween party in a sea of people… Or watching her from across the room of a funeral home whilst she played the piano and sung songs of simple and modest joy.

And he realises then that what he wants, and what Daryl wants, aren't that different at all.


	4. You

Later on, when the party has just started to die down and the people have decided to hit the streets for drinks, food, whatever... Norman realises that he can't find Emily.

He asks Lauren, Sonequa, Andy, but no one has seen her recently. Melissa… Christian… Alanna… Nothing. She's just gone. An even though it's probably nothing too big, he starts to panic.

When it's confirmed she's not in the ladies bathroom by the girls, and she doesn't respond to anyone's phone calls or texts, he hits the streets himself. Andy and Melissa offer to come with him, but he turns them down. Like Daryl when Beth is involved, Norman likes to be alone when it's Emily concerns.

He strides down a few back streets around the place the party was, hoping for a glance or a clue of where the hell Emily had gone, all the while hoping something bad hasn't happened to her.  _She isn't dead,_  he says over and over again.  _Not Emily._

_She's alive._

After a while of frantic walking, he finds himself in a small woodland park of sorts, and wanders in in the hope that Emily might be somewhere nearby. The trees are tall and dark, and they cast their shadows along the path he walks. The trail is gritty, his boots scraping at the little pebbles, and Daryl's crossbow is unusually heavy across his shoulder. He honestly doesn't know why the fuck he brought it.

Probably to frighten off any trouble he might face.

Yeah. That would give anyone one hell of a scare, a guy dressed as Daryl Dixon, who actually  _is_  Daryl Dixon himself, pointing an actual loaded crossbow in their face. That's enough to make anyone have an accident in their pants, especially in the dead of the night on Halloween night.

Norman walks through the park paths for what feels like hours, but what according to his phone is only about fifteen minutes, until he comes across a line of flowerbeds at what looks to be the centre of the park. He goes and stands by them, staring down into the array of colourful nature's stars, and picks out a few Cherokee roses and a bunch of weed with yellow petals. Two symbols of softness, one from Carol, the other from Beth.

He stares at them with a heavy heart, and decides to try Emily's phone one more time.

It rings, meaning it's still on, and he waits. Waits for something, anything. For her to pick it up and pour out a pile of reasons why she hasn't answered and why she's disappeared.

 _Oops, sorry I went home and fell asleep._ Or:  _I'm in your apartment waiting._

Just something to indicate that she wasn't lying in a ditch with a hole torn through her head, soaked in a pool of her own blood... That she wasn't  _gone_.

It's still ringing, and Norman taps his foot anxiously... And then he hears it. Emily's ringtone echoing out from just down the path. Taylor Swift's:  _Clean_ , ringing clear as day for his ears to hear. He lowers his phone and follows the sound of the music, feet carrying him quickly down the grit path, song growing louder and louder as he goes on.

And that's when he sees her.

Hair glowing white in the moonlight, standing beneath a street lamp for its yellow beam to light up her features and figure, the fake blood on her crystal red. She turns her head to look at him, eyes dark and hooded even in the light from the street lamp, and Norman let's out a shuddery breath when he sees she's been crying. Then he runs to her. Let's the crossbow drop to the ground with a loud  _thud!_ and bounds over to where she stands, his head and heart screaming a mixture of both Emily and Beth.

He comes running and his hug hits her with such a force she stumbles backward, one of her brown cowboy boots almost falling off in the process. His bare arms clamp around her tightly, holding her in place against his chest, and he shoves his face deep into her shoulder. At some point her arms come up and wind around his neck, and he holds her tighter, chanting silently against her neck,  _I got you. I got you, girl. You're here. You're alive._

_Just hold on._

He's such a state he forgets to yell at her for wandering off on her own without telling anyone, that he actually muffles a sob when her hands rub up and down the length of his back slowly, soothingly, mirroring his own action on her the day before. And then she takes his dirty face in her hands and forces him to look at her. When he does, the wounds and bruises on her face look all too real, and he can't help but plant his hands on the sides of her face too, and start tracing the false stitches she bears. His fingers caress the plains of her face until they reach the smear of red at the top she's added recently, probably with the tube of fake blood Michael brought. He picks at the now dry and flaky substance with his fingernails.  _Scrubs_  at it to get it off. To get it off her. Because none of it was ever supposed to happen to her, none of it.

When he'd gone in and yelled in Scott Gimple's face about what he was doing, what he was doing to her, and he'd just replied with  _he knew what he was doing_ , Norman had wanted to scream. Because this is Emily fucking Kinney they'd done this to.  _Emily_ , the sweetest, bubbliest, most genuine person you could ever meet. They'd grown her character into a storm who the fans had started to love so fiercely it rivalled even those of his own... And then all that had been stripped away. Gone with a couple of special effects on the computer, some sound effects, and a bit of fake blood like this.  _Gone_.

"Norman," she says as he continues to scrub at the makeup.

He doesn't stop. He can't stop.  _Won't_. Daryl wouldn't stop.

He doesn't think he'll ever be able to stop.

" _Norman_."

Suddenly it's all just a blur, and Norman neither knows nor cares what's going on.

She locks her lips onto his and kisses him with an intensity he's never known in all his years of on and off-screen kissing. Kisses him so wildly he's honestly surprised by her boldness. And he can  _taste_  the substances on her, the plastic tang of pretend blood and makeup, and the icing from those buns they made, where he licked the bowl clean and shrugged when she asked if he had.

So he kisses her back with all he's got. With every ounce of feeling he has, some Daryl and some  _very_  much him. Kisses her like Daryl would Beth if ever gotten the chance. Because he no longer had a chance, not anymore. That night in the funeral home back in season four had been his  _last chance_ , and he hadn't taken it.

So if this was Norman's last chance to kiss Emily… He wasn't going to make that same mistake.

"Do you get it yet?" she breathes between kisses, actions messy and uncoordinated, and Norman almost doesn't understand what she means.

"Get what?"

"You know."

He stops kissing her and just stares at her. A strong feeling of deja vu hits him, and he's reminded of a time so much simpler than this. When they would film silly scenes together like holding hands and giving piggybacks, wrapped up by an enthusiastic high five of success between the two of them. Back when everything felt so much brighter, like there was  _something_  the series was travelling to, and not just an endless nothing that brought them to their doom.

He remembers the way Beth looked at Daryl at that table, her eyes shining with candlelight, and thinks that maybe it wasn't all just Beth looking at him like that, like it want entirely all  _Daryl_. That was the start. The start of all of this. The continuous whisper in his ears that made him want to keep on running through the dark in search of a lone flame that may or may not have been blown out.

Could hope like that really be stubbed out so easily, like a used up cigarette? Could the rain that started to fall then be enough to drown it out so the water filled their lungs and forced them to draw their last breaths?

"Don't," he says, "Don't just shrug it off like that."

"It didn't stop Daryl."

"Yeah, and look where that got him."

She sighs.

He thinks he might too.

"Emily..." He strokes her cheeks with his thumbs, "Listen, ok. Daryl might not have been able to say it, but I can.  _I_  can still say it. I wanna say it... I  _gotta_  say it."

"Daryl didn't need to say it." she says, "And neither do you."

 _...Oh_. He's always wondered what that  _oh_  actually meant.

He wonders if Beth ever knew the extent of what Daryl felt for her, knew how much she meant and what she represented. Surely she must've had a bit of a clue, and that  _oh_  was her showing that. But when Norman watches her scenes in season five, and sees the way he was looking at her in that hallway corridor, he thinks she might not have been even  _close_  to understanding the depth of the intensity that man felt for her.

"I just wanted him to say it. Just once. Out loud."

"I think Beth did too. I know Lauren and I did."

He can't help the laugh that comes out at that. "Lauren's the biggest shipper of us there is. I bet she even invented the name."

"It wouldn't surprise me," she giggles breathlessly, before her voice turns soft and timid, "But... Do you think he ever will say it? Even now she's gone. Do you think he'll ever come out and say what he couldn't say to her?"

"I don't know, but I think that even if he doesn't... There'll always be times when the camera cuts to him, and you can just  _see_  exactly what he's feeling for her written all over his face. Like all that pain, all that love, just comes rushing back."

"She would have loved him too."

"You think?"

"Absolutely."

"How do you know?"

"Well it's like he said... The signs are all there. They  _are_ , Norman. She would have loved him so much, all that pain and heartbreak he was carrying would've just melted away. And he wouldn't feel the sting of those scars anymore."

"I think for a minute… He didn't feel them anymore. Because of her."

Her eyes glimmer.

"Loving her was the best thing he ever did." Norman says, "Being loved  _back_  by her would've been so good for him I can't even put into words how it would've made him feel."

Her expression breeds something of more intense blaze then, and she stares at him like he stares at her. Her hand shifts and clasps over his chest, right above his beating heart, and he swears she can feel it pumping from within its cage.

"Would it feel like this?" she whispers urgently.

He breathes out harshly.

She moves her hand that has the grubby cast on to his face, and strokes the stubble there. Her eyes drift to his lips, and he shivers.

"Would she kiss him like this?"

She plants the softest of kisses there, before leaning up on her tip-toes and planting another on his forehead. Her lips are wet from her earlier tears and they shake like leaves against his skin. And his heart skips a beat at what she says next.

"...Would she tell him she loves him as much as I love you?"

_What changed your mind?_

Her eyes wobble with tears.

_What?_

If only he'd said it. If only he'd just summoned the courage to spit out  _one_  word, because one word was all he needed. Just one. And it would mean for Daryl and Beth what he was about to say to Emily right now. This time no cock-ups, no awkward shrugging, and no opening the door to stray dogs that actually turned out to be a herd of monsters… Hope breeds courage, and that's what Norman has.

"As long as he tells her he loves her as much as I love  _you_."

Just one word was  _all_  Daryl needed.

"He just needs to say... You."

.

.

Sometime next week, Emily gets a call from Scott Gimple. Norman only hears about it because she rings him right in the middle of buying some wall paint with Mingus, and nearly deafens him with her screaming.

He asks her what the hell is wrong, and the answer makes him drop the basket he's carrying. And suddenly everything weird seems to make sense, and every last bit of hope he held onto doesn't feel wasted. Like the flame has been rekindled, and roared back to life. And with it…  _her_. And boy does he smile as Emily's giddy words repeat in his head, and he doesn't stop whistling the tune to  _Last Chance_  for a couple of days. Because it turns out it might not have been his last chance after all.

_Beth's coming back._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that is it. Thank you for reading, and have a fantastic Halloween! You rock. :)


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